I'm currently using an open source project called CodeFirstMembership for one of my projects. There's a critical issue that I need to get past, and the more I use it, the more I find things I need to modify. It's extremely useful, except it doesn't look like the developer has much time to update it (totally cool, we've all been there). I'm wondering about the etiquette and legality and general "hey, you stole my code you jerk" responses I'd get if I copied the source, moved it to github and made my own fork.

On Github, we do this all the time, forking projects, but it FEELs less jerk-ish because there's a connection to the original. Is there anything wrong with me doing this, whether legal or otherwise since there's no copyright notice or license associated with this library?

2 Answers
2

You can just fork it, send an email letting the original author know as a kindness. But you have to remember that the author has already told you you can copy it and modify it. No developer truly wants his code to bitrot. If you're lucky your modifications will be pulled back in.

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